In Uncle
Ernest, as in many of his other works, you will
want to turn away. You will see how love can twist and
deform the very ones it cloisters. In some of his other
collections, Larry has shown us how open, dry spaces can
lay bare secrets or be the perfect place to forget the
past. In the preceding pages, Larry reminds us that the
deep, dark woods nurtures secrets so dark, the mind can
barely conceive of them, even by those who commit the
atrocities. Too much distance from society twists and
hones the taboo into normal, but even out there, there
are still limits of what is acceptable; there is an
inherent moral compass. Sometimes, those minds bend to
envelope the deeds they've created, but sometimes they
break. Larry reminds us that madness is the only option
for some in order to cope.

In a blue expanse of desert sky, the blue moon shadow
of an owl's wing sliding across a clearing, or jars of sparrows'
hearts on a window sill, Larry shows us the delicious pleasure
and beautiful pain of the weight of memory, real and imagined. I
am comforted to know that Larry is there to remind us of the
things we're sorry we've forgotten and the things we wish we
could.

Courtney O’BanionMFA, Texas State UniversityProfessor of EnglishSan Jacinto College Central